


Superglue

by mithrel



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Blanket Permission, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Episode: s05e04 The End, Hugs, M/M, Nightmares, Podfic Welcome, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-20
Updated: 2009-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-13 14:00:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mithrel/pseuds/mithrel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean has trouble dealing with what happened when he was in the future.  Cas helps.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Superglue

“Dean.”

“ _Jesus!_ ” Dean yelped, bolting upright in bed, before he realized it was only Cas. He shot a glance at Sam, asleep in the bed next to his again ( _Where he belongs_ ), but he didn’t stir. “Cas, for God’s _sake,_ don’t sneak up on people like that!”

It was a measure of how much Cas had gotten used to him that he didn’t even bat an eye at the name-taking. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Yeah, well, you did,” Dean grumbled, unwilling to let it go. He should be asleep, but he knew if he did his dreams would be filled with blasted buildings, a Sam who wasn’t Sam anymore, and a Cas who’d lost his faith as well as his Grace. He couldn’t handle that.

“Are you alright?”

“I’m fine!” Dean snapped. Bad enough Sam always wanted to do the touchy-feely Dr. Phil crap, now Cas was pulling the same shit.

“You’re not. What happened? What did you see?”

Dean shook his head, staring at the floor, his lips compressed to keep in the sobs threatening to burst out. God damn Zachariah and Lucifer and everybody else.

“Dean,” Cas repeated softly.

Dean looked up at him, reluctantly, standing there in the same battered trenchcoat and suit he’d always worn, not the jeans and shirt he’d worn in the future, so much concern in his eyes Dean had to look away again. “I don’t want to talk about it.” It was more than that. He _couldn’t_ talk about it. If he talked about it, that would make it real, would mean it would happen, no matter what he did to try and stop it.

“You should.”

Dean collapsed back to the bed, sighing explosively. “Fine. But I need alcohol.”

Cas nodded, and Dean got out of bed, pulling on his jeans, and scrawled a note to Sam on the motel stationery so he wouldn’t think he’d changed his mind and taken off.

When they got to the Impala, Dean ran a hand over the gleaming black finish, convincing himself that his baby was alright. She purred to life just like always once he was behind the wheel, Cas silent next to him.

At the bar, they sat at a table in the corner. At this hour, most of the patrons had the air of people bent on drinking all the alcohol in the place, shoulders slumped and eyes haunted. Dean couldn’t blame them.

“Jack, straight up, and keep it coming,” he said when the waitress came over. He nudged Cas, who said, “Water.”

When the waitress came back, with a glass of water, a shot glass and a bottle of Jack, Dean poured a shot and slugged it down without tasting it, feeling the burn in his gut.

“Are you going to tell me what happened now?” Cas asked, sipping his water.

Dean grimaced, and poured another shot. “Zach wanted me to say yes to Michael, so he sent me to the future.”

Cas already knew that, but he only nodded.

Dean tried to figure out how to even begin to talk about this. “It…the demons had unleashed the Croatoan virus again, and he dumped me in the middle of a quarantine zone.”

Was it his imagination, or did Cas wince, just slightly?

“Anyway, I got out of there, barely, and hotwired a car to head for Bobby’s. Zach showed up and started bullshitting about how he wanted me to learn a lesson, see what happens if I keep saying no. When I got to Bobby’s…” His voice broke, and he stopped, drank down the shot and poured another one.

“When I got to Bobby’s, he was dead. Or at least his wheelchair had bulletholes in it. I found a picture of a camp in the journal and snuck in. First thing I saw was the Impala, wrecked and left to rust in the middle of a field. Next thing I know I’m knocked out.”

He took a deep breath as Cas waited for him to go on. “When I come to I’m handcuffed to a pipe, and staring at myself.”

“Dean in five years,” Cas murmured, and Dean nodded.

“Took awhile to convince him I wasn’t a shifter or a demon, and even then he wouldn’t uncuff me. He was…he was hard, ruthless. He shot someone in the head, because they’d been infected with the virus.”

Cas’ hand twitched, as if he were going to touch him but had thought better of it.

“There were only a few people left, at least at that camp. Most of humanity had been infected. Chuck was still there, and…and you, but…”

Cas poured him another shot, and he drank it down. “The angels had left, and when they did…when they did you lost your mojo, completely. You were human, like the rest of us.”

If Cas was disturbed by that revelation, he didn’t show it.

“You…he…spent most of his time stoned, organizing orgies.”

“And Sam?” Cas prompted, with uncharacteristic gentleness.

“Sam…wasn’t Sam anymore,” Dean choked.

“He said yes.” It was a statement, not a question, but Dean nodded anyway, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger.

“Dean…that other Dean…had found the Colt, and he was going to go after Lucifer. Took me with him, and you. When we got there, he sent the rest of you in through the front, even though he knew you’d be slaughtered.” He shuddered at the thought that he could ever be reduced to thinking like that, weighing the value of lives against the “greater good.” “It didn’t matter. It was a trap. Lucifer snapped his neck.”

“Dean…”

“He told me to say yes!” Dean burst out. “When I got back, he told me to say yes to Michael. And I thought, no, no way in hell, but if I can stop that…”

Cas put a hand on his arm. “Dean. Promise me you won’t say yes to Michael unless there’s no other choice.”

“But–”

“Promise me!” Cas repeated, his eyes blazing, voice resonant. At that moment he looked every inch a warrior of the Lord.

Dean shuddered slightly, still in the grip of his memories. “Alright, I promise.”

Cas waited to see if he had anything else to say, then murmured, “I think we had better go home now.” Dean nodded.

He got up from the table and staggered slightly. Cas caught him. Looking at the bottle, Dean was surprised to see it was more than half empty.

The waitress came back then, and he paid her, and Cas manhandled him out of the bar. Next thing he knew, they were in the motel room. Sam was still asleep.

“My car–” he began.

“Will be safe where it is for one night,” Cas told him. “You can pick it up in the morning.”

Dean squirmed. Of course, rationally, he knew that the Impala wasn’t going to rust out in one night, but…

“Or I can bring it back tonight, if you’d prefer,” Cas continued, and Dean nodded.

Dean kicked off his shoes and sat on the bed to remove his jeans. He lay down, staring at the ceiling. He felt better for having told Cas what happened, but it didn’t matter. He’d let everyone down, Sam, Chuck, Bobby, Cas especially…and now Cas had made him promise not to say yes to Michael, so it would all happen again…

With thoughts like that swirling in his mind, he finally fell asleep.

_He was creeping through the Sanatorium, the Colt in hand, hiding behind piles of rubble, making his way closer to the second floor. From around the other side of the building came the sounds of gunfire, as the rest of the team tried to fight their way in. He ignored it._

Some part of him knew that this was a dream and tried to wake up, but the dream had him in its claws and wouldn’t let go.

 _He was almost to the building when_ he _was suddenly there. Lucifer, dressed all in white, Sam looking taller, his shoulders broader, without his habitual slouch. He tried to raise the Colt, but Lucifer gestured and he was on the ground. As he struggled, he saw Cas lying near him, his blank eyes a mute accusation._

Dean writhed in the grip of the dream, but suddenly a hand pressed to his forehead, and the images smoothed away as if they had never been, leaving blessed oblivion in their place.

***

When Dean woke up, he saw Cas sitting in a chair next to the bed. “Wha…Cas? How long you been sitting there?”

“Most of the night.”

Dean sat up, and heard Sam stirring in the bed next to him. He stared at him. Sam. Not Lucifer. Wearing the T-shirt he slept in, his hair a mess, not the monstrosity in miles of white cloth. He darted a look back at Cas. Alive, in his usual rumpled suit, the trenchcoat draped over his lap.

“Mmfr,” Sam mumbled, breathing in long through his nose and opening his eyes. “Oh. Hey, Cas.”

“Good morning, Sam. Did you sleep well?”

Sam nodded.

“And you Dean?” Cas asked him.

“I…yeah,” he said, surprised. He remembered the dream, but it hadn’t lasted long, and after that he’d slept undisturbed.

Cas nodded. “Good.”

“So what now?” Sam asked.

“Let’s just…lie low for awhile,” Dean said, and when Sam looked at him in surprise, he said, “I mean, we need to figure out our next move. No sense rushing into things unprepared.”

Sam nodded, but his brow was creased and his lips pressed together, and Dean bemoaned the fact that he was going to have to put up with Sammy’s mother-henning.

“I am starved! Let’s get breakfast,” he said, swinging his legs out of bed, and Sam nodded.

***

Over the course of the next few days, Sam researched all he could about Lucifer and Michael. Cas was still hanging around, and Sam quizzed him for hours on what they could expect.

Dean didn’t really do much. Occasionally, when the motel got too confining, he got in the Impala and drove around awhile. Sam never asked him where he’d been, seeming to understand he needed space, and never asked him again what changed his mind. Dean was just as glad. Sometimes Cas went with him when he went out, not saying anything, just following him out to the car. Dean didn’t object, and Cas never said anything until they got back to the motel.

Every night the nightmares started, every night something chased them away, and every morning Dean woke to Cas sitting near his bed, keeping watch.

He knew Cas was keeping him from having nightmares, and some part of him was resentful, even as the rest of him was pathetically grateful. It wasn’t like he hadn’t dealt with nightmares before. He had forty years in Hell to use for fodder. And it wasn’t like he didn’t already owe the guy enough…

Cas had dragged him out of Hell, remade him, betrayed _Heaven_ for him, and why? What did Dean have that meant he deserved Cas’ friendship, his loyalty? He’d let so many people down, and he was going to let Cas down too. Cas might have remade his body, but his soul was battered, broken and shredded, and in five years he wasn’t going to even be human anymore.

“Why’d you do it?” he burst out one day, while Sam was at a local internet café doing research.

Cas cocked his head at him. “Do what?”

“Why’d you drag me outta Hell, why’d you let me out of the green room, why’d you go up against Raphael?” _He didn’t do it for_ you, a voice inside his head sneered. _He was obeying orders when he resurrected you, and the rest of the time he was trying to stop the Apocalypse._ He shook his head, denying what the voice said, even though he knew it was true.

Cas cocked his head at him, his eyes gone soft. “You are more worthy than you think, Dean.”

And that, _that,_ after everything, was what broke him. He felt sobs tearing their way out of him and tried to hold them back, but they had nearly twenty-five years of horror, guilt and self-loathing behind them, and they wouldn’t be stopped.

Cas crossed the room before Dean even noticed, wrapping his arms around him, and Dean cried into his shoulder, getting snot and spit all over his coat as Cas held him and made meaningless soothing noises.

When the storm of weeping finally let him go, his eyes felt sore and gritty and his nose was raw and probably red as a beet. Without a word, Cas pulled him into the bathroom. He took a piece of toilet paper and held it out to Dean. “Blow.”

Dean was about to protest that he was old enough to blow his own damned nose, but Cas’ expression said he’d brook no argument, so he did.

Cas ran the water in the sink, took one of the hotel washcloths and wiped Dean’s face, then dried it and led him out of the bathroom to sit on the bed.

He squatted in front of him, in a position that should have been impossible, but he didn’t seem to be in any discomfort. “Dean, I want you to listen to me. I didn’t pull you out of Hell because you’re Michael’s vessel, or the only one who can stop the Apocalypse. I did it because you’re Dean Winchester, because you hold others’ lives more dearly than your own, because you’d give anything, even your own soul, to save an innocent or protect those you consider family. I did it because you take on more than anyone should, can possibly bear, and yet you somehow manage.”

Cas reached forward and put his hand over the mark on Dean’s shoulder. A jolt went through him, like when you jab a fork into a filling, settling down into a thrum like an engine idling, something full of potential, not _bad,_ just strange.

Cas stared at him solemnly, his clear eyes bluer than anything Dean had seen before. “You _will_ defeat Lucifer. And I will help you.”

And for the first time since Dean broke down the convent doors too late to stop Sam from killing Lilith, he believed it.


End file.
